R. Morris - The Gentle Axe

The weighing tray plummeted with a heavy clatter, as though angry at being disturbed. The diener gradually added weights to the opposing plate until the weighing tray rose and bobbed and settled. “Thirty-nine lot, zero zolotnik, and twenty dolya, ” he announced, glancing to the doctor for his reaction.

“Within the parameters of normality,” said Dr. Pervoyedov. “Put it on the dissecting table, and I’ll take a section to look at under the microscope.”

“Would it not be possible to test the stomach contents first?” There was a slight edge of impatience to Porfiry’s voice. “I am eager to know if there is any evidence at all of poisoning.”

Dr. Pervoyedov seemed genuinely shocked by this suggestion. “But that’s not the Virchow method. By that method, I must complete my examination of the lungs before moving on to the next organ. What method are you suggesting I follow? It’s not the Rokatinsky.”

“I suggest you follow the”-Porfiry Petrovich hestitated only for fraction of a second-“the Pervoyedov method. By which you prioritize the order of examinations in order to confirm or refute the suspicions of the investigating magistrate as quickly as possible.”

“The Pervoyedov method, you say?”

“You could write a learned article on it. For the Russian Journal of Pathology. ”

“Ah, but the thing to do is to be published in Germany. That’s the thing,” said Dr. Pervoyedov, waving a scalpel carelessly.

“Well, then. Write it in German.”

“The Pervoyedov method…It has a certain ring to it.” Dr. Pervoyedov grinned. “Unfortunately, the method you propose is, from a scientific point of view, utterly nonsensical. If I were to attach my name to it, it would very likely spell the end of my career as an academic pathologist.”

“It would be looked upon very favorably by the judicial authorities.”

“Ah, yes. I don’t doubt it. That’s the thing, you see. There you have it in a nutshell, Porfiry Petrovich. On the one hand, you have the interests of science. On the other, the interests of the office of the investigating magistrate. I had hoped they were the same. But the more I do this job, the more I learn they are not.”

“I trust our interests are the same. Both parties want the truth.”

“But you will insist on dictating which truth you want.”

“That’s unfair, Dr. Pervoyedov. I am merely seeking to influence the order in which the various truths concerning this case are discovered.”

The diener had by now weighed the second lung and was waiting for instruction.

“You know he’s proposing to fine me, don’t you,” said Dr. Pervoyedov with sudden and sincere bitterness.

“I’m sure Prokuror Liputin can be prevailed upon to drop the intended disciplinary proceedings against you.”

Dr. Pervoyedov considered Porfiry briefly. He shook his head with an indulgent smile as he turned his attention back to the dead man. “Very well. Give me the stomach now,” he said to the diener.

Crooked and bulging, the stomach was sluiced off and placed in an enamel bowl. Dr. Pervoyedov slit the finely veined sac along its tense convexity. A stinking, murky liquid spilled out, and the stomach collapsed into a wrinkled yellow skin.

“Be thankful, gentlemen,” said Dr. Pervoyedov. “He has not eaten solids recently. But judging by the smell, he has drunk vodka.”

“There was an empty vodka bottle found by the body,” said Porfiry. “Some vodka from it appears to have been spilled onto the carpet.”

“It would be as well to test that too.”

Porfiry nodded.

Dr. Pervoyedov opened a drawer in one of the laboratory benches. “I regret that Prokuror Liputin is not here to oversee my actions,” he said. He had in his hand a tab of litmus paper. The doctor dipped the litmus paper into the liquid. An intense red stain spread over it eagerly. He showed it to the official witnesses without comment. They were at a loss as how to meet his arch, questioning expression. Their nods were hesitant and solemn. “Ah well, at least you gentlemen are here to see that I do things properly this time.”

The doctor drew a quantity of the liquid into a syringe, which he then siphoned into a glass retort. With its long tapered spout at the side, the vessel had something of the appearance of a capsized swan. Dr. Pervoyedov showed a large brown bottle to the witnesses, his expression again pointed. The bottle was labeled SULFURIC ACID. The witnesses smiled weakly, averting their eyes and shuffling their feet like reproached schoolboys. The doctor shook his head and turned his back on them. He added a few drops of the sulfuric acid by pipette and shook the retort lightly. He then transferred it to another bench in the laboratory where there was a deep metal tray filled with sand, nesting on a burning gas ring. He closed the retort with a glass stopper and twisted it into the hot sand. He carefully turned the screw of a clamp to hold it at the neck.

“Satisfied?” he asked, with a half turn to the official witnesses. They communicated in dumb show that they were. “Really? Are you trying to catch me out, gentlemen? That’s very mischievous of you. Very mischievous indeed.”

Dr. Pervoyedov nodded to the diener. The assistant picked up a glass tumbler and crossed to one of the high windows of the pathology lab. A slab of winter pressed against it, its vast blankness even swallowing the black iron bars on the outside. The diener swung open an inner pane, and the air became suddenly sharp and hostile, a splinter of the great destructive force that was ravaging the city. He worked the tumbler between the bars, scooping up the icy snow that had settled on the ledge. His movements, as he closed the window, had a nervous haste to them. He put Porfiry in mind of a jailer sealing the cell of a dangerous prisoner.

Dr. Pervoyedov attached a small receiving vessel to the end of the retort’s long spout. He now bedded this into the tumbler of snow. He shook his head and chuckled to himself. “They tried to catch me out. Imagine! They thought I would forget to collect the distillate.” When he was satisfied with the arrangement, he went back to the table where the empty stomach lay in a pool of slops.

With a deft and decisive manipulation, he turned the stomach through, revealing the furrowed musculature of its interior.

“The stomach lining shows no sign of being subject to any corrosive action.” Dr. Pervoyedov sounded almost disappointed.

“Does that rule out prussic acid?” asked Porfiry anxiously.

Dr. Pervoyedov glanced at the official witnesses, as if to say, Why don’t you ask them? But he contained his resentment. “No, no. Not at all. Oh no. Although it does rule out almost any other poison you might care to mention. In some ways, it makes prussic acid more likely. If poison has been used at all, that is. We must wait for the real test, however.”

“And how long will that be?”

Tiny globules of condensation were beginning to show inside the receiving vessel.

“Not long now. Not long at all, Porfiry Petrovich.”

WHAT DID HE DO, this man, in life?” asked Dr. Pervoyedov, as he removed the receiving vessel from the retort. Barely more than a meniscus of clear liquor had collected. Dr. Pervoyedov rotated the vessel as if he were appreciating a fine cognac.

“He was an actor once, I believe,” said Porfiry.

The doctor raised his eyebrows. He poured the liquid into a test tube, which he placed in a wooden rack. He turned briskly to the diener. “I will need sulfate of iron, solution of potassa, and muriatic acid.”

The diener nodded and crossed to a cabinet. He brought the bottles over one by one. Using both hands to tilt and steady the first of them, Pervoyedov tipped out a small quantity of glassy pale green granules onto a circle of filtration paper. He held the paper over the test tube and tapped until one of the grains fell in. He waited for it to dissolve, then added a few drops of the solution of potassa. He stirred the contents with a glass rod, his gaze challenging the official witnesses. “Let us see if, in death, he has any talent for ventriloquism.”